The invention relates to a process for manufacturing mechanical, electromechanical and opto-electromechanical mirostructures having suspended regions subject to mechanical stresses during assembly.
As known, during the manufacture of microstructures of mechanical, electromechanical and opto-electromechanical type, suspended regions are formed which may be damaged by mechanical stresses induced by the final assembly processes. For example, during the manufacture of integrated hard disk drive units, comprising a microactuator to which a read/write head is glued, the steps of attaching the head to the microactuator and gluing, and causing pressure on the rotor of the microactuator, may cause the breakage of the suspension points of the rotor and the collapse thereof. Similar problems arise in opto-microelectromechanical devices where it is necessary, for example, to move an optical fiber with a micromotor. The forces required for this assembly operation, of the order of tens of grams force, may irreparably damage the moving parts of the microstructures.
An embodiment of the present invention provides solutions to reduce the risk of breakage of the suspensions of the moving parts of microstructures of the mentioned type.
The invention provides a process for manufacturing microstructures, as defined in the claims.